Alexi McNabb

I am a Siren, a sea nymph that resides on the island of Anthemoessa. I have the body of a

bird and the head of a woman.Note I was once a handmaiden of Persephone, along with my two

sisters.Note Her mother Demeter gave us the bodies of birds to help search for Persephone when

Hades abducted her. We eventually gave up and settled on the island of Anthemoessa.Note When a

ship sails near, we sing, offering them their greatest desires. They sail towards us, crashing on

our island to die.

In the Odyssey, I am one of the obstacles that Odysseus faces after Circe. He cleverly had

his men stuff their ears with wax and bind him to the mast of his ship. As they passed, we sang.

We told him that if he came to use to listen, he would leave wiser. Even though he attempted to

come, his men bound him with more rope.

One other crew has passed by our island without crashing, but they did not hear our song.

Their ships musician played his lyre, drowning out our singing. Rude.

I am one of the obstacles representing temptation. I promise your hearts desire, but if

you come, you will instead crash, and your bodies will rot on the island. All men that have

passed the island have failed to resist temptation, crashed, and died on the island.

I think that Odysseus is very clever, but I dont like him much for it. Him being the only

man to hear my song and pass, I dont like him much at all. Especially because he cheated. If

someone hears my song, they crash on my island. He heard my song, he should have crashed and

rotted. Or jumped and swam to my island. But none of that happened. His ship sailed away with

him still on it.

People seem to not be sure how my sistersNote and I died. Or if we died. One of the

thoughts that people have is that we dove into the sea and drowned ourselves from despair after

Odysseus heard our song and left alive. The other big one is that we dove into the sea and turned
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to stone, after the other ship passed by without anyone hearing our song. But Im very clearly

alive, so everyone thinking either of those ideas is wrong. Though we may turn into stone if we

die.

People remember me, but not as a nymph with the body of a bird. In most depictions, I

have the lower half of a fish. A fish. I am incredibly insulted by this. I dont know where they

would have gotten the idea that Im part fish, but it is incredibly inaccurate and insulting. Being

on an isolated island does not mean that I swim. I flew there, I didnt swim there. It isnt that

complicated. Another less insulting, but still inaccurate, misrepresentation is from the Middle

Ages. During that time my sistersNote and I were thought to be the unhappy souls of the dead.

Inaccurate, but not offensive. Biggest mistake is thinking were dead. Or souls in general. Were

very much alive. Though we are unhappy sometimes.

The most well-known modern depiction of a Siren, even though it is inaccurate, is in the

Starbucks logo, which was chosen to represent the irresistibility of its coffee. I really doubt its

anywhere near as irresistible as my singing. I dont think anything is that irresistible.

Something else people always seem to argue about is what happens to the men that crash on the
island. A lot of people think that we eat the men that crash, but some other people argue that
since their flesh rots on the island, it means that we dont eat them. The people that say we dont
eat them say that we are sustained by our divine feathers. All Im going to say about that is that
rotting meat being around doesnt necessarily mean that none of the men get eaten.
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Sources Cited

Crystal, Ellie. "Sirens Mythology - Crystalinks." Crystalinks. N.p., n.d. Web. 15 Dec. 2016.

Kelly, Sophia. What a Beast!: A Look-it-up Guide to the Monsters and Mutants of Mythology.

New York: Franklin Watts, 2010. Print.

"SEIRENES." Theoi.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 15 Dec. 2016.

Shmoop Editorial Team. "The Sirens in The Odyssey." Shmoop. Shmoop University, 11 Nov.

2008. Web. 15 Dec. 2016.

"Sirens." The Encyclopedia Americana. Vol. 24. Danbury, CT: Grolier, 1998. 848. Print.

"The Sirens, Scylla and Charybdis, the Cattle of the Sun." Infoplease. Infoplease, n.d. Web. 15

Dec. 2016.

Note: Anything marked with a Note is something that varied among sources, or was in some

sources, but not others. The exact parts that are human and bird of the Sirens varies; sometimes

its how I described it, and sometimes they are described as having human arms as well. I chose

three sirens over two, even though two is the number from the Odyssey, because if I were to only

go with what is in the Odyssey, I would lack the history that welcoming other pieces of Greek

mythology gives. The island is not named in the Odyssey, and different sources give different

names. Last note: